As the Summer 2012 Olympics in London gear up, the media will be presenting a number of inspirational stories about athletes who have overcome odds, worked hard and sacrificed tremendously to achieve their dreams.

These stories speak to an ethos that has long been embedded in the collective imagination: athletics are about determination, grit and ambition, and they take place within a fair system by which anyone can emerge victorious. Unfortunately, some people will be missing from this inspirational pretty picture — namely transgender athletes, intersex athletes and athletes with disabilities.

Not everyone in these categories is excluded from the Olympics or other high-level competition, but the rules applied to these populations raise some tough questions about the way we as a society think about sports. Everyone, it seems, loves the heroic story of someone who has overcome all odds, and, as such, are drawn, for example, to stories of “miraculous” people with disabilities who achieve great things “in spite of their handicap.”

The same is true for transgender and intersex people: the public likes stories with happy endings, the tales of pioneers.

However, the lines of these inspirational stories are carefully drawn by those outside of the group. Those who are gender-normative and able allow people in those categories to be inspirational, but not in a way that actually brings “magical” persons inside their normative circle. The trans, disabled or intersex “hero” is a misnomer: when it comes to “hero” status, people in these groups are still stigmatized.

Often, athletes are cordoned off inside their own Olympics-like events. There is a Special Olympics, a Gay Games, a World Games for the Deaf. These events are not a bad thing, as they allow huge community gatherings and celebration of athletes in these groups (the World Games for the Deaf, for example, invites participation based on cultural affiliation, not level of hearing loss.) When some athletes can only compete in these special “versions” of the Olympics, the inspirational stories are told in a nonthreatening way, off to the side.

Some athletes are allowed to compete in the Olympics proper — people with disabilities who do not use assistive technology deemed “unfair,” transsexuals who have completed sex-reassignment surgery and hormone therapy, and intersex people who meet a certain androgen test.

But the question isn’t so much about who’s let in as it is about who’s excluded.

This narrative in the collective imagination about fairness means that the rules come down hard on those who are perceived to be taking advantage — athletes found to be doping, for example, or judges who mark unfairly. The fairness narrative is a form of magical thinking, however, because not eveyone who has an advantage in competition is penalized. Some advantages are okay. Everyone knows that some athletes do better because of body composition, because they were born into a family with thousands of dollars to devote to the sport or a country with an intense dedication to athletic victories, or because they were lucky enough not to get an injury. These are seen as “fair” or “natural” advantages, and we celebrate these athletes.

When a person who has differences related to gender or doesn’t fit ability norms is able to compete against the highest level athletes without these differences, accusations of unfairness immediately start to fly. Our collective magical thinking about the pool of “fair competition” does not extend to those we fear, revile or want to think of as objects of pity, rather than triumph.

When an athlete is able to run faster using a prosthetic leg than athletes who does not need this assistive technology, for example, the “advantage” conferred by technology is seen as an “unnatural” advantage that amounts to cheating, and the athlete with the prosthetic cannot compete in the Olympics. When a female athlete has too many androgens, or is taking hormones but has not completed sex reassignment surgery long enough ago or at all, she is positioned as a male in disguise with an unfair advantage over her competitors of “the weaker sex.”

Certainly, there are some legitimate questions about what is fair and unfair in athletics. I’m not sure exactly what sports should do about the gender issue, for example, though I agree with Lindsay Parks Pieper that a standard based on actual physical characteristics would be more fair. If sports are to allow more athletes using assistive technology to compete, then there will be some line in the sand that will need to be drawn, and I’m not sure exactly where that line should fall.

I believe the solution to these problems, though, is not any particular change in the rules, but rather a change in the way these issues are discussed. Public conversations need to get away from a theme of deception when discussing trans, intersex and disabled athletes.

Will men simply present and identify as women in a ploy to win Olympic gold?, skeptics ask. This question ignores the real lived experience of trans and intersex women, just as claims about cheating with assistive technology ignore the real lived experience of people with disabilities. This is about authenticity, and the myth of fair and just “leveling” of the playing field through discriminatory rules denies several large groups of people the right to show their authentic human selves and legitimate accomplishments.

Wherever sports authorities draw the line, the athletes involved must be a part of the conversation, and their experiences must be included when making the rules.

Avory Faucette is a radical queer feminist activist, writer, and legal scholar who writes at Radically Queer, Girl w/ Pen and Queer Feminism with a focus on trans identities, intersectional work and policy change.

This article is part of a series published by RH Reality Check in partnership with the Global Network of Sex Work Projects (NSWP) to commemorate the International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers, December 17th, 2010. It is excerpted from Research For Sex Work12, published 17 December 2010 by the NSWP, an organization that upholds the voice of sex workers globally and connects regional networks advocating for the rights of female, male, and transgender sex workers. Download the full journal, with eight more articles about sex work and violence, for free at nswp.org. See all articles in this series here.

Andrea is in her early twenties. She comes from a poor family in the provinces of a Southeast Asian country. Unlike most women, she has a male birth certificate. She is a transgender woman.

Andrea has felt female as long as she can remember, and began living a female life as soon as she could. For this she was insulted by neighbours, teased by teachers and classmates at school, beaten up and raped by a bunch of young boys one night, and eventually beaten and disowned by her father. She dropped out of school, left home and migrated to the city, to stay with an older transwoman from her home town who, it turned out, was a transgender sex worker working the streets. Andrea didn’t much like the idea of sex work, but without education or connections was unable to get a job. Being ‘trans’ worked against her. No one wanted to employ her, even as a waitress or shop assistant. She turned to the ‘entertainment’ sector. Unable to get a job as a bar dancer or hostess, and barred from nightclubs and discos (all because she is trans), she too began to work on the streets. She has done it for five years, earning money for food and lodging, and a little extra for hormones and new silicon injections for her hips and breasts.

Andrea’s story is one of many thousands of transwomen worldwide (especially those like Andrea who are rural, less educated and socially isolated) who turn to sex work, not as the most attractive of a range of job options, but as the sole viable option for survival. Doubly stigmatised as transsexuals and as sex workers, pushed into street work, they become victims of abuse and violence perpetrated by bystanders, customers, their own ‘sisters,’ and (sadly) even by those who should be protecting them – the police.

As Andrea soon found out, competition on the streets is tough. There are too many trans sex workers and too few customers. Increasingly, her competitors are younger and more attractive. There have been fights over customers. Bystanders often abuse her verbally. Customers sometimes refuse to pay, angrily claiming they did not know she is trans. She has been beaten a few times. She knows others have been murdered. Nowadays, in order to avoid violence, she makes clear to every man who approaches her that she is transgender, even if that loses her customers.

Discrimination, Abuse and Violence

Latin America perhaps presents the most shocking examples of violence against transwomen, especially sex workers. Possibly hundreds of travesties have been murdered in recent years. But the situation in Asia, with which we are more familiar, is pretty bad too. Continent-wide conservative attitudes and religious beliefs fuel intolerance and stimulate discrimination, abuse and violence against transgender people; particularly against transwomen. All three thrive because concepts of individual rights and equal opportunity are often undervalued or unenforced.

A few recent cases from the first half of 2010 illustrate the situation well. An ultra-nationalist group in Mongolia has beaten, abducted and raped transwomen, and has issued death threats, all because they consider these persons un-Mongolian. A Vietnamese woman was gang-raped, her case making news because her legal status (male) invalidated any rape charges against the perpetrators. In Bali, transwomen have been pursued, assaulted and humiliated by young men who have shaved the hair from their victims’ heads. In Turkey there has been a long series of incidents involving thugs beating transwomen on the streets, and police arbitrarily arresting, beating and humiliating transgender activists. In a most recent incident, just a few days before completion of this article, a Turkish transwoman was found murdered; stabbed twelve times and with wounds from her throat to her stomach. Finally, across Indonesia, thugs have broken into meetings of transwomen and driven away the participants, chasing them into the streets, all on the grounds that they are un-Islamic.

Partner violence against transwomen seldom makes it into the newspapers or web blogs. And yet it is a major problem. Many transwomen drift into abusive and violent relationships through low self-esteem. Once there, many feel unable to leave their partners. Beliefs about gender roles foster an even higher tolerance for violence. One South Asian transwoman admitted, “I don’t mind if my girya (man) beats me up. It only shows how manly and powerful he is.” Another claimed, “When my parik (“husband”)beats me, I feel as helpless as a woman.Since I want to be a woman, it actuallymakes me feel good.“1

As is already apparent from the Turkish example above, abuse and violence are often perpetrated by state organs supposedly there to protect the weak. In Kuwait, Nepal and India there have been clear cases of organised police violence against trans communities; so organised as to take on the appearance of ‘sexual cleansing’ programmes (apparently aimed at instilling fear into transwomen intending to come out of their homes). In some countries anti-homosexuality laws have been used to oppress transwomen, and anti-sex work laws have been used to oppress transgender sex workers (along with others). In Cambodia, programmes of forced occupational rehabilitation for sex workers have resulted in transwomen (and other women) being placed into training programmes aimed at providing workers for the garment industry. Not for nothing does APNSW (the Asia-Pacific Network of Sex Workers) feature a ‘no sewing machines’ image as its logo.

Andrea has had her share of police encounters. The police often harass her and have arbitrarily arrested her. Police extortion is a problem too (either after arrest or as a condition for not arresting her). A few times they charged her with being a nuisance to tourists (though in each case it was the tourist who approached her). At other times they found her in possession of a condom and charged her with prostitution, which is illegal in her country. She now does not carry condoms anymore, and often has unprotected sex. She had twice been sexually assaulted in a police station, once by two police officers, and another time by a male inmate with whom she had been locked up. In each case there was no condom used. She recently found out that she is HIV positive.

High-risk Sex

Worldwide, HIV prevalence rates for transwomen are commonly found to reach double figures. One suspects that the precise figure often depends in part on the proportion of the sample involved in sex work. High HIV infection rates, often coupled with lack of access to HIV/ AIDS care, arguably represent the most glaring example of violence perpetrated against transwomen. This is not just about commercial sex or receptive anal intercourse; transwomen’s HIV rates are sometimes higher than those for female sex workers or men who have sex with men. Rather they are the inevitable consequence of widespread prejudice that frames transgenderism as unnatural, immoral or mentally disordered; of legal frameworks that view transwomen as men, denying them respect, equality and dignity as women; and of laws that criminalise sex between transwomen and men as same-sex activities.

In these circumstances many trans sex workers drift or get pushed into high-risk sex. Water-based lubricants may be too expensive. Some substitute them with oil-based lubricants (including engine oil), which are known to corrode condoms. Sex work on the street may be hurried (leaving less time for a condom anyway). In any case, trans sex workers like Andrea often avoid carrying condoms and lubricants as a way of depriving police of evidence of sex work. Rural migrants, often cut off from family, and less educated and informed than their urban counterparts, are particularly at risk for unsafe sex. Drug and alcohol use, which are quite common among those involved in transgender sex work, exacerbate the problem. Viagra and its analogues, making for longer and repeated sexual intercourse and raising the risk of anal wounds, also increase risk.

Many trans sex workers, despite being poor, need money for hormones, silicone injections or surgery. The associated costs increase their poverty, making it harder to refuse a customer who does not want to use a condom. And then there is the pervasive problem faced by many (trans)women worldwide: low in self-esteem and desperate for a life partner, glimpsing an opportunity for a long-term relationship, wanting to put trust in someone, they cease to use condoms all too quickly.

Human Rights

The organisers of a recent Barcelona conference on transgender rights (the first truly global conference organised by and for transpeople) were keenly aware of violence in the lives of transpeople, especially of trans sex workers.2 Several sessions touched on sex work and violence issues. A document on violence and criminalisation, widely endorsed in a plenary final session, declared a set of basic rights relevant to all transpeople, but often denied to them – especially to those in sex work.3 With regards to violence, the document calls upon Governments:

to recognise and condemn as human rights violations all cases of transrelated violence;

to investigate such cases of violence (including when perpetrated by organs of the state);

to provide fully funded trauma counselling and care for survivors of trans-related violence;

to enact laws providing protection against such violence;

to provide free and equal access to the justice system for transpeople; and

to provide administrative, security and legal personnel with sensitivity training on trans issues, as well as on human rights standards on transrelated issues.

In Asia we are a long way from implementation of the list of principles and recommendations produced in Barcelona. Hopefully, some day in the future, properly observed and implemented, they will contribute towards a much needed improvement in the quality of life of Andrea, other trans sex workers, and of transgender people in general.

About the Authors

Khartini Slamah is coordinator of the Asia- Pacific Network of Sex Workers (APNSW) and a founding member of the Asia-Pacific Transgender Network. Sam Winter is associate professor at the University of Hong Kong, director of the Transgender ASIA Research Centre and a board member of WPATH (the World Professional Association for Transgender Health). Kemal Ordek is the general secretary of Pink Life LGBTT Solidarity Association ( Pembe Hayat, the only trans rights association in Turkey); and sexual orientation and gender identity taskforce member of the Youth Coalition for Sexual and Reproductive Rights.

Notes

1 Cited by Shivananda Khan in a paper presented at the 2nd International Expert Meeting on HIV Prevention on MSM, WSW and Transgenders, Amsterdam, November 2009.

2 The International Congress on Gender Identity and Human Rights, Barcelona, June 2010. A key feature of this conference, drawing participants from six continents, was that almost all attending were transpeople, and many were sex workers.

Andrea is in her early twenties. She comes from a poor family in the provinces of a Southeast Asian country. Unlike most women, she has a male birth certificate. She is a transgender woman. Andrea has felt female as long as she can remember, and began living a female life as soon as she could. For this she was insulted by neighbours, teased by teachers and classmates at school, beaten up and raped by a bunch of young boys one night, and eventually beaten and disowned by her father. She dropped out of school, left home and migrated to the city, to stay with an older transwoman from her home town who, it turned out, was a transgender sex worker working the streets. Andrea didn’t much like the idea of sex work, but without education or connections was unable to get a job. Being ‘trans’ worked against her. No one wanted to employ her, even as a waitress or shop assistant. She turned to the ‘entertainment’ sector. Unable to get a job as a bar dancer or hostess, and barred from nightclubs and discos (all because she is trans), she too began to work on the streets. She has done it for five years, earning money for food and lodging, and a little extra for hormones and new silicon injections for her hips and breasts.

Andrea’s story is one of many thousands of transwomen worldwide (especially those like Andrea who are rural, less educated and socially isolated) who turn to sex work, not as the most attractive of a range of job options, but as the sole viable option for survival. Doubly stigmatised as transsexuals and as sex workers, pushed into street work, they become victims of abuse and violence perpetrated by bystanders, customers, their own ‘sisters’, and (sadly) even by those who should be protecting them – the police.

As Andrea soon found out, competition on the streets is tough. There are too many trans sex workers and too few customers. Increasingly, her competitors are younger and more attractive. There have been fights over customers. Bystanders often abuse her verbally. Customers sometimes refuse to pay, angrily claiming they did not know she is trans. She has been beaten a few times. She knows others have been murdered. Nowadays, in order to avoid violence, she makes clear to every man who approaches her that she is transgender, even if that loses her customers.

Discrimination, Abuse and Violence

Latin America perhaps presents the most shocking examples of violence against transwomen, especially sex workers. Possibly hundreds of travesties have been murdered in recent years. But the situation in Asia, with which we are more familiar, is pretty bad too. Continent-wide conservative attitudes and religious beliefs fuel intolerance and stimulate discrimination, abuse and violence against transgender people; particularly against transwomen. All three thrive because concepts of individual rights and equal opportunity are often undervalued or unenforced.

A few recent cases from the first half of 2010 illustrate the situation well. An ultra-nationalist group in Mongolia has beaten, abducted and raped transwomen, and has issued death threats, all because they consider these persons un-Mongolian. A Vietnamese woman was gang-raped, her case making news because her legal status (male) invalidated any rape charges against the perpetrators. In Bali, transwomen have been pursued, assaulted and humiliated by young men who have shaved the hair from their victims’ heads. In Turkey there has been a long series of incidents involving thugs beating transwomen on the streets, and police arbitrarily arresting, beating and humiliating transgender activists. In a most recent incident, just a few days before completion of this article, a Turkish transwoman was found murdered; stabbed twelve times and with wounds from her throat to her stomach. Finally, across Indonesia, thugs have broken into meetings of transwomen and driven away the participants, chasing them into the streets, all on the grounds that they are un-Islamic.

Partner violence against transwomen seldom makes it into the newspapers or web blogs. And yet it is a major problem. Many transwomen drift into abusive and violent relationships through low self-esteem. Once there, many feel unable to leave their partners. Beliefs about gender roles foster an even higher tolerance for violence. One South Asian transwoman admitted: ‘I don’t mind ifmy girya (man) beats me up. It only showshow manly and powerful he is.’ Another claimed: ‘When my parik (“husband”)beats me, I feel as helpless as a woman.Since I want to be a woman, it actuallymakes me feel good.’1

As is already apparent from the Turkish example above, abuse and violence are often perpetrated by state organs supposedly there to protect the weak. In Kuwait, Nepal and India there have been clear cases of organised police violence against trans communities; so organised as to take on the appearance of ‘sexual cleansing’ programmes (apparently aimed at instilling fear into transwomen intending to come out of their homes). In some countries anti-homosexuality laws have been used to oppress transwomen, and anti-sex work laws have been used to oppress transgender sex workers (along with others). In Cambodia, programmes of forced occupational rehabilitation for sex workers have resulted in transwomen (and other women) being placed into training programmes aimed at providing workers for the garment industry. Not for nothing does APNSW (the Asia-Pacific Network of Sex Workers) feature a ‘no sewing machines’ image as its logo.

Andrea has had her share of police encounters. The police often harass her and have arbitrarily arrested her. Police extortion is a problem too (either after arrest or as a condition for not arresting her). A few times they charged her with being a nuisance to tourists (though in each case it was the tourist who approached her). At other times they found her in possession of a condom and charged her with prostitution, which is illegal in her country. She now does not carry condoms anymore, and often has unprotected sex. She had twice been sexually assaulted in a police station, once by two police officers, and another time by a male inmate with whom she had been locked up. In each case there was no condom used. She recently found out that she is HIV positive.

High-risk Sex

Worldwide, HIV prevalence rates for transwomen are commonly found to reach double figures. One suspects that the precise figure often depends in part on the proportion of the sample involved in sex work. High HIV infection rates, often coupled with lack of access to HIV/ AIDS care, arguably represent the most glaring example of violence perpetrated against transwomen. This is not just about commercial sex or receptive anal intercourse; transwomen’s HIV rates are sometimes higher than those for female sex workers or men who have sex with men. Rather they are the inevitable consequence of widespread prejudice that frames transgenderism as unnatural, immoral or mentally disordered; of legal frameworks that view transwomen as men, denying them respect, equality and dignity as women; and of laws that criminalise sex between transwomen and men as same-sex activities.

In these circumstances many trans sex workers drift or get pushed into high-risk sex. Water-based lubricants may be too expensive. Some substitute them with oil-based lubricants (including engine oil), which are known to corrode condoms. Sex work on the street may be hurried (leaving less time for a condom anyway). In any case, trans sex workers like Andrea often avoid carrying condoms and lubricants as a way of depriving police of evidence of sex work. Rural migrants, often cut off from family, and less educated and informed than their urban counterparts, are particularly at risk for unsafe sex. Drug and alcohol use, which are quite common among those involved in transgender sex work, exacerbate the problem. Viagra and its analogues, making for longer and repeated sexual intercourse and raising the risk of anal wounds, also increase risk.

Many trans sex workers, despite being poor, need money for hormones, silicone injections or surgery. The associated costs increase their poverty, making it harder to refuse a customer who does not want to use a condom. And then there is the pervasive problem faced by many (trans)women worldwide: low in self-esteem and desperate for a life partner, glimpsing an opportunity for a long-term relationship, wanting to put trust in someone, they cease to use condoms all too quickly.

Human Rights

The organisers of a recent Barcelona conference on transgender rights (the first truly global conference organised by and for transpeople) were keenly aware of violence in the lives of transpeople, especially of trans sex workers.2 Several sessions touched on sex work and violence issues. A document on violence and criminalisation, widely endorsed in a plenary final session, declared a set of basic rights relevant to all transpeople, but often denied to them – especially to those in sex work.3 With regards to violence, the document calls upon Governments:

-to recognise and condemn as human rights violations all cases of transrelated violence;

-to investigate such cases of violence (including when perpetrated by organs of the state);

-to provide free and equal access to the justice system for transpeople; and

-to provide administrative, security and legal personnel with sensitivity training on trans issues, as well as on human rights standards on transrelated issues.

In Asia we are a long way from implementation of the list of principles and recommendations produced in

Barcelona. Hopefully, some day in the future, properly observed and implemented, they will contribute towards a much needed improvement in the quality of life of Andrea, other trans sex workers, and of transgender people in general.

About the Authors

Khartini Slamah is coordinator of the Asia- Pacific Network of Sex Workers (APNSW) and a founding member of the Asia-Pacific Transgender Network. Sam Winter is associate professor at the University of Hong Kong, director of the Transgender ASIA Research Centre and a board member of WPATH (the World Professional Association for Transgender Health). Kemal Ordek is the general secretary of Pink Life LGBTT Solidarity Association ( Pembe Hayat, the only trans rights association in Turkey); and sexual orientation and gender identity taskforce member of the Youth Coalition for Sexual and Reproductive Rights.

Contact person: Sam Winter, sjwinter@hkusua.hku.hk

Notes

1 Cited by Shivananda Khan in a paper presented at the 2nd International Expert Meeting on HIV Prevention on MSM, WSW and Transgenders, Amsterdam, November 2009.

2 The International Congress on Gender Identity and Human Rights, Barcelona, June 2010. A key feature of this conference, drawing participants from six continents, was that almost all attending were transpeople, and many were sex workers.

]]>http://rhrealitycheck.org/article/2010/12/16/stigma-exclusion-violence-against-trans-workers/feed/3Get Real! We Did Everything We Could to Make Things Go Just Right, But it Didn’thttp://rhrealitycheck.org/article/2010/08/27/real-everything-just-right-didnt/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=real-everything-just-right-didnt
http://rhrealitycheck.org/article/2010/08/27/real-everything-just-right-didnt/#commentsFri, 27 Aug 2010 06:00:00 +0000Communication, consent, empathy, and sensitivity are critical to good sexual experiences, no matter your partner.

My girlfriend and I are both non-op transsexuals; (i.e., she’s MtF, I’m FtM, and we haven’t had “the surgery” and don’t intend to.) On a visit with her a little while ago, she and I were sitting in her car and talking about our feelings regarding sex. When our relationship started over a year ago she asked me to wait, which I was fine with, but didn’t know she had been open to what we considered “in between” kind of stuff like oral (she doesn’t want to go “all the way” because she was raped a little while before I met her and she feels like penetrating me is putting me in her position–it isn’t, but I’m not going to pressure her), and while we had been discussing it we realized we were both in the mood and I asked her if she wanted to find some place more private and explore, and she said “only if you want to.” I did.

Before we got started, I asked her if she still wanted to continue and if she had any other boundaries she wanted to set in place, and she said no. I reminded her that if she wanted me to stop at any time she could say so and I would stop everything.

While I was working with her and experimenting with what she liked I got a lot of positive feedback and encouragement. It was very clear that she was enjoying what I was doing, which felt amazing for me, too. But after we finished and cleaned up she got withdrawn and awkward, and we didn’t talk much on the way back to her friend’s apartment. What I could get out of her was that she felt guilty for being the only one who got off (part of why she didn’t reciprocate was her fear of getting me pregnant, and having trouble working with how fickle my body is, so it wasn’t an issue for me), and, just before we got back to the apartment, she confessed that she might not have been as ready as she felt. She kept apologizing until we each went to sleep, no matter how much I tried to convince her that it wasn’t her fault.

Later that morning when we were able to talk it over more I kept reminding her that it’s hard to make good decisions in the heat of the moment and that it’s okay to feel regret, that I didn’t expect perfection, and that even under the best circumstances sex is complicated and I’m willing to wait again. But she still feels bad.

Is there anything more I can say and do to help her feel better now, or the next time we have a sexual experience, or should we put it away for a while and let her sort through some of her feelings, first? And is it wrong/unfair to her for me to think of how she climaxed and be as turned on by it as I am? Because when I do I can’t help but think I’m not respecting her feelings.

Heather Corinna replies:

I don’t think either of you made any major missteps, or said, did or felt anything that wasn’t okay or was in any way intentionally hurtful to one another or yourselves. I’m seeing excellent sexual communication (better than most people tend to have), phenomenal understanding, empathy and acceptance of differences in your sexual wants and readiness, clear and enthusiastic consent (and all the room in the world for easy nonconsent), and a whole lot of sensitivity and mutual care. I don’t think one can go about this any better than you both did. If there was an Oscar for sexual communication and negotiation, you two’d get it this year, no contest.

There seem to be two central issues here: her feeling like she was ready in advance of sex and then, afterwards, feeling like she may not have been and her feeling guilty or unhappy that she had an orgasm while you did not. There is also the issue of you feeling guilty because she feels conflicted about her decision to have sex, but you found her experiencing what she did with you sexy. Obviously, too, you want to figure out how to move forward from here. Most of what I have to say is going to be about pieces one or both of you may or may not have that you can talk about moving forward. You may have even talked about some of them already.

Let’s start with pleasure and orgasm. Orgasm isn’t necessarily an indication of pleasure or satisfaction, even though it often is. Orgasm also isn’t necessarily an indication that in a scenario where one person reaches orgasm and the other does not, the person who reached orgasm was more satisfied or had a more pleasurable experience than the other, even though that can and does certainly happen. What orgasm is, for the most part, is a whole-body reaction to nervous system stimulation, usually — but not always — expressly sexual stimulation, and usually — but not always — because we are having sexual feelings in our hearts and minds. The “not always” in both cases is important. For example, some people orgasm when they are sexually assaulted, some people do in their sleep, some people do via sensory stimulus they strongly feel is not sexual for them at all. As well, some people have good sexual experiences, even amazing ones, where they experienced pleasure and felt satisfied but did not reach orgasm, either by choice or because that’s just not what happened. You may need to remind your girlfriend of that, especially if her experience is different, where she may not feel satisfied without orgasm, or have yet had an experience where she felt satisfied without it to understand that.

It’s fairly common for people to expect and want both people to reach orgasm in a sexual experience. However, I’d say that’s not as typical as a lot of folks imagine, and it is particularly uncommon when anyone is new to sex, or when any kind of sex is new in a given relationship. Often, it takes time for people to get comfortable enough to let go physically and emotionally so they can reach orgasm, and it can also take time for people to learn each others bodies (including our own) well enough for that to happen frequently. It’s safe to say that for people on the whole, all people involved in sex reaching orgasm every single time is the great exception, rather than the rule. It’s also typical for people to either not recognize, overlook or undervalue the fact that when we’re really into someone, our experience of pleasure isn’t usually just self-centered, but about what’s happening with our partner. In other words, you very clearly did enjoy yourself, and got a lot of pleasure and satisfaction from the pleasure she was experiencing. This is something you might want to talk about with her if you haven’t already.

One thing that can also amp all of this up is if we’re adding prototypical gender scripts to any of this stuff. A whole lot of women have the idea that guys are the ones who are always supposed to get off — and if they don’t, their partner must have done something wrong or been somehow lacking — while women may or may not. Scripts like that are so pervasive that few people are immune to them, especially in relationships in which there is one man and one woman. While people who either are not heterosexual and/or are not gendernormative can often be less impacted, I don’t think that someone is automatically immune to these scripts by virtue of being outside those groups. In some ways, I get the impression some trans people can feel even more impacted by ideals like that because of the high pressure put on you to conform more and more strictly to hegemonic gender scripts than cis gender people in order to “prove” your gender is authentic. So, that’s something else you two may want to check in on. This may be doubly loaded for her expressly because of her gender identity: both because she’s trans and because she’s a woman.

All the same, those gender scripts aren’t often correct or accurate for people, including cis gender people. While there are some broad commonalities we can claim, for the most part no one group of people — including the group that is all of us people — gets off on any one thing, in any one setting, in any one kind of partnership or dynamic. Just like we all have good days, bad days and meh-days in other areas of our lives, the same goes with the sexual part of our lives. Our experiences are going to tend to vary a lot from day to day and life-phase to life-phase. It might be helpful to check in on that, too, and also to do some more talking about the ways each of our experiences pleasure, what pleases you, what makes you feel satisfied. That way, you can both be sure that if you’re inclined to follow, intentionally or not, any scripts, the ones you’re following are your own, authentic to each of you as individuals, rather than being more about general expectations or cultural sexual ideals. This may be one of those talks that winds up happening because of something not-so-pleasant that turns into a great takeaway that’s beneficial for you both, one you might not have gotten to otherwise.

Let’s talk some about her readiness now, and her feeling in hindsight that she may not have been as ready as she felt before having her actual experience.

I used to teach kickboxing. Now and then, someone would come into my class who was clearly a big-time beginner, so I’d suggest they take things slow and easy. But then they’d get really into it, feel full of energy, strong and gutsy, and want to push themselves further. So long as it didn’t seem like they’d seriously injure themselves, I was not going to keep telling them to slow down because that would have been tremendously patronizing, and I needed to trust they knew themselves and their bodies better than I could. To treat them with respect, I needed to acknowledge that they were in a position to make their own choices about how much they wanted to push the envelope and let them decide how much, within reason. Sometimes those folks would do just fine and feel great during and after. Sometimes they’d feel great during, but come back next week and say their shoulders hurt like hell, and would say that this time, they were going to take it a little more easy. Sometimes they’d wind up running outside after a bunch of spinning kicks, toss their cookies on the sidewalk outside the gym and not even come back inside class at all that day, because they felt so embarrassed at having clearly done more than they were able to handle. There really was little I could do to forsee or control any of those outcomes beyond the basic warnings and gentle coaching I did already.

This is a lot like that. You’re not psychic and neither is she. She did her best to be self-aware and to communicate where she was at with you, you did the same. You each gave each other the respect around that people give each other who are partners, not parents. You two clearly felt you wanted the same things at the same time, which you both chose to pursue. You both enjoyed the experience at the time, but you left it feeling like it was the right thing at the right time for you, and she left it feeling like it wasn’t for her. That’s okay. You’re two different people, which means that often enough, you’re not going to have the exact same experience with things you experience together.

We can all prepare ourselves for something we have not yet experienced all we want, and that preparation is important. At the same time, there are some things we are going to tend to only find out once we are actually doing or have done that thing. There’s no shame in learning new or unexpected things about ourselves, no shame in making what we thought was a right call for us and finding out that maybe it wasn’t, no shame in discovering that we were not actually ready for something we thought we were. This is how, after all, most of us learn a whole lot of things in our lives, by trial and error.

I’d let her know that she doesn’t owe you any apologies: neither of you did anything wrong to each other here. I’d let her know that while however she’s feeling is okay, that she doesn’t need to feel ashamed or embarrassed about either her choice at the time or her feelings after-the-fact. It sounds like you’ve already let her know that you are 100% fine with how she’s feeling, and 100% fine with where she wants to go from here. Now you can just let her know that whatever conclusions she comes to? It’s also all good. You might also do some talking, after she’s had some time, to try and unpack together why she felt she was feeling so bad: that might also help her better clarify what she needs to really feel ready.

It may help to let her know that the myth of the “perfect” first time with a partner is often just that. Sex, like life, is most frequently imperfect, and that’s okay. First-time sex — heck, sex any time at all — with someone more often than not is not all floaty-awesome-flawless, but tends to carry complexities and uncomfortable vulnerabilities we may not forsee or anticipate, as you said. People are complicated, so expecting sex not to be, however common an expectation that is, doesn’t make a lot of sense. Part of what can make sex so incredible is that it can sometimes allow us to be very real and flawed with each other, even when we’re strongly vulnerable, so this experience being so real, and not the stuff of romance novels, is more good-thing than bad-thing in my book. Twenty years from now you’re much more likely to remember things like all the communication you had around this than to remember one orgasm you had.

You asked about if I think it’s be a good idea to step back from sex and give her some more time to sort through how she’s feeling. That does sound like a good plan to me, so I’d put that out there to her, reminding her that as you have been in the past, you’re just fine with waiting again. Perhaps obviously, if any of this felt triggering for her in terms of her past assault, if she’s working with anyone in counseling, supporting her in talking to her counselor about this, and getting an extra opinion on if this is a sound pace for her, would also be a good move.

Lastly, I don’t think you’re being disrespectful because you found her pleasure and/or orgasm arousing and exciting. In the moment, that’s what it was for both of you, and you can only really walk away with your own feelings, not with hers. You can hear, hold and understand hers, but you still had the experience you had, and it also sounds like the experience both of you had when you were having it was very positive. You can certainly talk this through with her if you both want to, but not only do I see nothing in how you’re feeling that disrespects her, I see nothing in the way you describe your relationship that suggests you are likely to be disrespectful.

This is one of those questions where, when I read it, what I see are two people being so excellent to each other who are probably each feeling bad about things they just don’t need to mostly because they so badly want to be excellent to each other.

There are limits to our interpersonal excellence. Even when we are interrelating magnificently, sometimes we or people we care for are still going to be disappointed, get their feelings hurt, or make missteps. There’s never any avoiding that completely, because we’re all only human and because we can get as close as possible to someone else, but we still can’t live in their heads and hearts. As well, as we go through life, we’re all in a neverending learning process to figure out what’s right for us and how to go through life making choices well. None of us are born savant in that respect: we all tend to gradually improve at it over time.

The best we can do is to do our best at being honest with ourselves and honest with each other; at leaving room for each of us to be our own person; at communicating deeply, clearly and often, at setting and honoring boundaries and by being caring and loving, at making choices for ourselves that impact others with both of us in mind as much as possible. It appears you’ve both been doing all of those things beautifully. All of that will absolutely tend to limit how often you get or feel hurt or disappointed, and how deeply you do when it does happen. But it can’t eradicate the risk of either.

If and when hurt or bummed-out-ness does still happen — and it will — then what we can do is use all of those great skills and intentions to be there for each other, to support one another, and to make allowances and adjustments as needed for others nd also for ourselves. In the end, that probably doesn’t make anything perfect, but that’s okay, because few things in life are ever perfect. (Also? I think perfection is overrated, and I say this to you as a terminal perfectionist, no less.)

It’s clear you hate to see her feeling bad because you care about her, and you may also have some feelings of guilt of your own this. But sometimes, even when people do everything as right as they can, people are going to feel bad and will need to some time to work through that. I know that sucks and can make you feel precarious or insecure, and I also know it sucks do do everything as right as you can and have it not go as right as you want, especially with big deals. And yet, sometimes, that’s just what happens. You and she both may need to work through some of your bad or guilty feelings alone before coming back at them together.

I think if you keep communicating, and keep supporting her as well as you obviously do, giving her what time she needs to process her feelings and figure out what her own next best steps are. If she decides she needs to put sex or certain kinds of sex on hold, I don’t need to tell you the best response is to honor that: you already know that. If she comes back saying she still wants to pursue sex, I don’t see any reason to distrust her in that, either, especially so long as you two continue to relate as well as you have been. You, also, get to take what time you need to process this and you, also, get to decide to step things back or make adjustments if you need to.

What I’ll leave you with, besides my best wishes and a few extra links that I think may help, is just a reminder that you clearly have and have created the good stuff here, quite exceptionally. Having beautiful, marvelous relationships isn’t about every aspect of them being flawless, but about accepting, supporting and caring for each other even when — and maybe even especially when — things don’t go as we’d have liked or aren’t exactly as we wanted. And from what I can gather, you two need very little help in that department. :)

]]>http://rhrealitycheck.org/article/2010/08/27/real-everything-just-right-didnt/feed/4Removal of Mental Illness Diagnosis for Transsexuals in France Called “Symbolic Victory”http://rhrealitycheck.org/article/2010/03/02/removal-mental-illness-diagnosis-transsexuals-france-called-symbolic-victory/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=removal-mental-illness-diagnosis-transsexuals-france-called-symbolic-victory
http://rhrealitycheck.org/article/2010/03/02/removal-mental-illness-diagnosis-transsexuals-france-called-symbolic-victory/#commentsTue, 02 Mar 2010 06:33:00 +0000Last month, France became the first country in the world to remove transsexualism from its official list of mental disorders, reports Time magazine, in what is being considered a major, though some say largely symbolic, victory.

]]>Last month, France became the first country in the world to remove transsexualism from its official list of mental disorders, reports Time magazine in what is being considered a major, though some say largely symbolic, victory.

In practice, according to the author of the Time article, Gaelle Faure, this change “will do little” to improve the legal and medical rights of transsexuals in the country, as they will “still be required to have a sex-change operation before they can change their gender in the eyes of the law.”

And to get the green light for surgery, they must still undergo extensive medical and psychiatric evaluations. “It’s a symbolic victory,” says Georges-Louis Tin, president of the Paris-based IDAHO committee, which fights homophobia and what it calls “transphobia,” or discrimination against transsexuals. “Transsexuals are no longer mentally ill,” he says. “They’re normal citizens. But we haven’t yet reached the point where they’re allowed to make their own decisions instead of depending on doctors and psychiatrists.”

While some celebrate the change as a first step, others are worried that by taking this step the French government hopes to avoid debates such as those on gay marriage.

And France is still far from a paradise for transsexual citizens.

As the Faure notes:

A just-released study commissioned by the Health Ministry, for example, paints a dreary picture of the treatment of transsexuals from a legal and medial standpoint. Sex-change surgeries and treatments are covered by the state — as in some other countries — but those who opt for surgery have little choice in selecting their doctor. Surgeons complain that they are poorly equipped to perform the complicated procedures and that few have received specialized training, according to the survey. And some even say they are ostracized by their colleagues if they perform such surgeries. For these reasons, many transsexuals choose to undergo the procedure — at their own cost — across the border in Belgium, home to some of the best sex-change specialists in the world.

And France still requires that transsexuals undergo surgery — and become sterilized — before they can receive identity cards and other official documents confirming their new gender. “If we refuse, we’re basically undocumented,” says one advocate. “According to most advocates,” writes Faure, “about half of transgender people — a term many prefer, though the French state doesn’t use it — have no desire to go under the knife, preferring instead to simply live their lives as a member of the opposite sex in their dress and behavior.”

“This will be the next big battleground,” writes Faure.

Spain and Great Britain have adopted more lenient stances, even though transsexualism is still technically on the books in both countries as a mental illness. Spain requires transsexuals only to undergo some form of hormonal treatment to modify their physical appearance before it will issue new documents, while the British simply ask applicants, with recommendations from their doctors, to promise to live out the rest of their lives as their chosen sex.